Patent Search Skill
This skill points Claude at the BigQuery patent-search tools registered by the patent-creator MCP server. Call the tools directly; do not shell out to Python.
When to use
- Find prior art by keyword, classification, or family.
- Pull full patent records (title, abstract, claims, description) for US patents.
- Cross-reference an EP/WO patent into its US family member to get full text.
Available MCP tools
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
search_patents_google | Recommended. Full-text keyword search worldwide (claims and description included), one search credit per call. Needs SERPAPI_API_KEY (free plan: 250/month). |
check_google_patents_status | Is the key set, and how many searches are left this month (free to call). |
search_patents_bigquery | Fallback keyword search across title / abstract / claims (US only for claims). ~341 GiB, about $2, per search. |
get_patent_bigquery | Patent details by publication number: bibliographic data + claims by default; abstract and description are opt-in. |
get_patents_bigquery | Same, for up to 50 patents in one query at the cost of one lookup. |
search_patents_by_cpc_bigquery | Search by CPC classification prefix. |
search_patents_by_ipc_bigquery | Search by IPC classification prefix (good for older or non-US patents). |
search_patent_family_bigquery | All publications sharing a family ID across jurisdictions. |
check_bigquery_status | Verify auth and quota project before a long workflow. |
Cost notes
BigQuery on-demand pricing is $6.25 / TiB (1 TiB free per month). The MCP server enforces a per-query bytes-billed ceiling, defaulting to 350 GiB. Override via PATENT_BIGQUERY_MAX_BYTES_BILLED if you need a larger scan window.
The patents table is unclustered, so a detail lookup costs the same for one patent or fifty; the cost depends only on which sections are requested:
| Detail lookup | Scan | Cost |
|---|---|---|
Bibliographic only (include_claims=False): title, dates, family_id, CPC/IPC | ~44 GiB | ~$0.27 |
| Default: + claims | ~160 GiB | ~$1 |
+ abstract (include_abstract=True) | +~200 GiB | exceeds the default cap together with claims |
+ description (include_description=True) | ~1.1 TiB | exceeds the default cap |
So: batch with get_patents_bigquery, pass include_claims=False when you only need codes or family_id, and take abstracts from the search results rather than re-fetching them.
Choosing keywords
search_patents_google:
- All words must match; "double quotes" match an exact phrase. No stemming, so search synonyms and plurals separately.
- Lead with the invention's distinctive terms. Common words match thousands of patents and push the closest art down; in testing, adding "heart valve" to a query buried the target past #300, while its distinctive claim words found it at #48.
- Use
limit=100: it costs the same one credit aslimit=10. - Stay inside a classification by adding a full CPC group:
"voice biometric" CPC=G10L17/00(a bareCPC=G10L17finds nothing). - Results show one row per publication, so a US patent and its EP family member can both appear.
search_patents_bigquery (fallback):
- 2-3 keywords work better than long phrases (BigQuery
LIKEmatching is literal). - For non-US patents,
claimsis empty in the dataset; the MCP keyword tool already searches title/abstract for those jurisdictions. For full text on EP/WO, use the EPO OPS tools instead. - Use
search_patent_family_bigqueryto bridge from an EP/WO hit to its US family member when you need claims.
Common workflows
Prior art sweep:
search_patents_google(query=…, limit=100)— broad full-text scan, worldwide (fallback:search_patents_bigquery(query=…, country="US")).- Pick the top hits' CPC codes with one
get_patents_bigquery(patent_numbers=[…], include_claims=False). search_patents_google(query="<terms> CPC=<group>/00", limit=100)— pull adjacent technology (fallback:search_patents_by_cpc_bigquery, ~234 GiB a search).
Cross-jurisdiction lookup:
search_patents_google(query=…, country="EP")(fallback:search_patents_bigquery(query=…, country="EP")).- For the EP hits, one
get_patents_bigquery(patent_numbers=[…], include_claims=False)to get theirfamily_ids. search_patent_family_bigquery(family_id=…)to find the US member with full claims.
